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HomeMy WebLinkAboutvance letter 2Moghannam, Kathleen From: Snellings, Tim Sent: Friday, April 22, 2011 8:25 AM To: Pat Vance Cc: Moghannam, Kathleen Subject: RE: Thoughts of a law enforcement agent on Pot Thanks Pat. This will be included in information provided to the Board. Take care, Tim Tim Snellings, Director County of Butte Department of Development Services 7 County Center Drive Oroville, CA 95965 530-538 682'1 (direct) ~. FIR#~ u5 flR ~~~'~~ From: Pat Vance [mailto:patpvance@nvwisp.com] Sent: Friday, April 22, 2011 1:00 AM To: BOS District 4; Connelly, Bill; Yamaguchi, Kim; Wahl, Larry; Kirk, Maureen; Snellings, Tim Subject: Thoughts of a law enforcement agent on Pot I received this today from a very frustrated person in law enforcement. I sent him some of my letters that T had sent to you. I thought T would share his prospective with you, in an effort to help guide you in a decision on the new ordinances coming up for a vote. The information helped me understand how this law has made California Iook more like Mexico or Columbia. With unscrupulous Dr's leading the way, The need to confront not only the growing, but the Dr's is vital to solving this horrible problem in our community. Pat, the truth is that marijuana is illegal in every aspect in California except under proposition 215 for medicinal use of marijuana. It is against federal law to possess, grow and use marijuana period. In California you can't grow it for someone else (unless you are a true caregiver for that person and assist them beyond growing their medicine), you can't give your marijuana away to anyone else, you can't sell it (obviously), you can't trade it, you can't help others with the cultivation of theirs, they can't help you with yours, you can't transport it for anyone else and they can't posses anyone else's marijuana. The whole idea surrounding dispensaries is a complete joke and one that is completely illegal. Like all these big gardens you see throughout your neighborhood, they look somewhat legal at first glance, but if you really look at it, and you see and know haw they actually operate and what they're real intentions are, they are absolutely illegal. Co-ops are supposed to be a group of people that work together and grow their medicinal marijuana and then they disperse the marijuana equally to all involved participants. The only money legally involved is the expenses to grow their medicinal marijuana. They can't sell it for profit, or between participating parties in the co-op, and they can't sell it or give it away to anyone outside of the co-ap that didn't actively partake in growing their icinal marijuana. Eve yore involved h to have a legal and valid recommendation from a Dr to grow medicinal marijuana (there lies one of the biggest reasons why this how became the problem that it is). There is supposed to be a medical reason for a medicinal marijuana recommendation. Many Dr's are advocates and many others take advantage of the money and hand them out like candy, and often even provide the patient with a reason if they can't come up with one themselves. I have heard this story from many patients. Give me a break, an I8 year old kid that's never had a laborious job in his life needs to smoke pot because he has chronic back pain {the only thing chronic about this situation is the weed he's smoking). A 15 year old girl has bad cramps (endometriosis} so her parents sign for her to receive a recommendation for medicinal marijuana (15!}. The Dr (a local Dr} told the parents that the age of the child doesn't matter as long as they have parental consent and pay $180. Now to dispensaries. So now your co-op/ collective needs a place to distribute all the marijuana that they harvested from their 100 plants. A low but fair estimate would be roughly 4001bs. They weigh it and divide it all up into different amounts and types {strains). They open up a store front business to accommodate all their members to distribute the marijuana and allow them easy and convenient access to the marijuana that they just spent their (or their parents) life savings on and slaved over with sweat and tears for the last 6 months. So now the participating co-op members can come and ga anytime they want and get their marijuana. That's the legal thought behind it and the bullshit story that they all try to claim. The truth behind it... A group of people get together and find a place to grow their marijuana. They all have recommendations and they really try to stay within the guidelines, but of course they have to have extra plants laying around in case one of their plants dies (gotta have reserves, and oh yeah, of course they forgot about the ones sitting in the bushes all by themselves away from the main grow, and they forget to tell you about the other grow sites that they are running or associated ta). Everything looks legitimate and they make it to harvest without getting tripped up or caught by law enforcement. Then they harvest their small forests and take their marijuana down to a dispensary that they have a good, trusting working relationship with {and they are supposedly members of) and they sell it to them! The dispensary weighs it, packages it, and sells it in the store to anyone that wants to buy it from them providing they have a valid recommendation from any Doctor (whether they helped grow it or not and more often than not they didn't). They might get $2500.00 per pound (although the market was so flooded this year they were lucky to get $1000.00). You do the math, 6 plants = 24 lbs, $2500.00 per lb x 241bs = $50,000. Not bad for a summers work? Now multiply that by hundreds of plants and you can see why it is so enticing and worth the risk to many (i.e. names of specific growers and the rest of their entire crew and organization). If they don't sell to a dispensary in California then they sell it to a dealer or distributor in California or out of state. That's the story in a nut shell. Naw 1 understand that there are people out there that actually use marijuana far true medicinal purpose it was intended for (and what the people of California voted for}. They stay within the guidelines and 6 plants is more than a years supply of marijuana for them {even if they're eating it, cooking with it, using it as a tincture, and smoking it). They don't even have problems answering questions and they are completely cooperative and polite with law enforcement and are pleased that they stopped by to check out their plants and to make sure they are within the guidelines because all they really want to do is be able to grow their medicine. I have no problems with these people.